In the Book Notes series, authors create and discuss a music playlist that relates in some way to their recently published book.
Travis Jeppesen’s novel Settlers Landing is fantastically absurd, a book written for our times and beyond.
I don’t listen to music when I’m writing anymore, though music is still an important part of the writing process for me. I always feel that there is an intrinsic rhythm and musicality embedded within the writing – and if that kind of flow isn’t there, then that means it’s not working, and so I put on the brakes. With a book as large as Settlers Landing, with its numerous characters, episodes, and storylines, there are also a number of songs and soundlines embedded within the thing, some of which I was only dimly aware of in the process of composition, but would come to the surface later on when I was reflecting. I’m probably forgetting some, but these are the most important.
“Do Re Mi” – The Sound of Music
Let’s start at the very beginning: a very good place to start.
“Express Yourself” by Charles Wright & the Watts 103rd Street Rhythm Band
This song became my rallying anthem on those days when I needed to get myself motivated to write, and is a somewhat sardonic prism through which to view the book’s narrative. We’re living in an era in which “expression” has been co-opted by corporations and their algorithms, by people calling themselves “creatives” whose job is to dream up fantastic new ways to sell things to us. When certain ways of spending money are argued, in earnestness, to be exercises in “free speech.” Need I go on?
“Express Yourself” by N.W.A.
How could I omit N.W.A.’s amazing cover/re-visioning of Wright’s song?
“Respect” by Aretha Franklin
There’s a watercooler rumor going around the office in the book that Mrdok, the billionaire at the center of it all who causes so many problems, employs a gospel choir to perform this song for him as he is making his morning toilet.
“LA Noise from Tokyo” by Hijokaidan
One of Mrdok’s sons, Stevo Rey, is a noise musician living in Tokyo. Hijokaidan is one of my favorite Japanoise acts. The vocals by Junko, who has been described as “the grand dame of Japanese shriek,” are up there with the legendary Adris Hoyos of Harry Pussy.
“I Fought the Police” by Harry Pussy
In an interview with a publication calling itself Williamsburg Ovo-Lacto Fruitarian, Stevo Rey points out the similarities between Hijokaidan and Harry Pussy; though the latter is perhaps best known today as being the launching pad for the phenomenal guitarist Bill Orcutt, whose solo stuff I listen to all the time.
“Down on the Corner” by Creedence Clearwater Revival
For murky historical reasons, the only imported music that the indigenous islanders of Sagosia, the fictional island at the center of the novel, enjoy and regularly spin in rotation is Creedence Clearwater Revival. This is probably my favorite song by that band – “Lodi” coming in at a close second.
“Te Reo Akakino” by Te Ava Piti
Sagosian music is briefly described in the book, though of course it is difficult to invent in words a wholly new musical genre from an island that doesn’t actually exist. As I was writing the book over the past decade, I traveled to a lot of island nations and listened to the local music. Among my favorite discoveries was these guys, from French Polynesia, and their ten thousand ukuleles.
“Sur Ma Guitare” by Jai Pleure
Another great discovery from either Tahiti or Bora Bora, appearing on a compilation called Musica Tahitiana. I believe it’s a cover of a Johnny Hallyday song.
“Stratocaster” by Kool Keith
Lil Bigfoot is a hip hop artist who falls afoul of the law and has to leave the US, so he winds up joining Mrdok in his adventure of colonizing Sagosia. I’m a big fan of lyrical hip hop, and to me, Kool Keith is the reigning genius in the field. He always manages to find other equally brilliant wordsmiths to feature on his albums. He’s incredibly prolific, as his epic discography makes clear, but Feature Magnetic is probably my favorite of his albums.
“Fantasy” by Mariah Carey
“The summer’s hit R&B love jam comes jiving through the speakers, crooned by a Grammy-winning pop star renowned for her ability to hit notes so piercingly high that at outdoor stadium concerts, birds have been known to come tumbling out of the sky…”
“Don Giovanni, K. 527: In quali eccessi” by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Without giving too much away, excess being one of the novel’s major themes…
“Popular Movies” and “Popular Music” by Neil Hamburger
At one point, Mrdok and some of his employees wind up at a bar in Ibiza filled with drunk British tourists being entertained by a guy billed as “the world’s worst comedian.” I wonder where that idea came from.
Travis Jeppesen is the author of ten books, including The Suiciders, Victims, and See You Again in Pyongyang. He has contributed articles to The New York Times Magazine, Artforum, Mousse, Wall Street Journal, The Believer, Review of Contemporary Fiction, and other media. An accomplished art critic, he is the recipient of an Andy Warhol Foundation Arts Writers Grant. His calligraphic and text-based artwork has been the subject of solo exhibitions at Wilkinson Gallery (London), Exile (Berlin), and Rupert (Vilnius), and featured in group exhibitions internationally. Jeppesen curates a living archive of his work at travisjeppesen.substack.com.